Only You Can Save Mankind

By Terry Pratchett

Rating: 4 1/4 stars

Reviewed by Noelle

This is the first book in the Johnny Maxwell series. Johnny is an ordinary 12 year old, a bit of an outsider even. His parents have been fighting a lot, so Johnny has been taking refuge in playing video games that his friend Wobbler gives him. It is while he is playing the space game, Only You Can Save Mankind, that the message appears on his screen:"We wish to talk." Johnny plays along and finds that the aliens in the game want to surrender to him and are asking for safe conduct back to their home planet. When he sleeps, Johnny finds himself in a real cockpit in space, talking to the captain of the ScreeWee, and protecting their fleet. Because when Johnny's ship is blown up, he wakes up in front of the computer. But when a ScreeWee ship blows up, they die for real. What do you do when something you (and everyone else) thought was a game, turns out to have real consequences? Can Johnny step up and be a hero? And will anyone else even believe him? This is a funny and inventive bit of science fiction that is enjoyable all the way through.